OR I). INSJESSORES. 



TRIBE— DENTIROSTRES. 



FAM. MUSCICAPID^. 

 GENUS MUSCIPETA. 

 PLATE VII. 



MUSCIPETA PARADISEA. 



PARADISE FLYCATCHER. 



Synon. — Musdcapa paradisi, L. — M. Indica, Stephens. — Upupa paradisea, L. — M. casta- 



nea, Termn. 



I HAVE introduced here a drawing of this well known. Flycatclier, to prove the fact 

 that the Micscipeta Indica and M. paradisea of authors are one and the same species. 

 This I presume has been suspected more or less by various Naturalists, for Colonel Sj'kes 

 in his Catalogue of Bhds of the Dukkun* speaking of these two supposed species, says, 

 " These two birds have been lately erroneously considered to belong to one species. They 

 were never found, however, by Colonel Sykes (who shot manj') in the same locality, nor 

 did he observe any intermediate state of plumage. The difference between the females 

 of the two bhds at once decides the distinction of species." For my own part though 

 I recognised the exact identity of size and structure, I never doubted that Colonel Sykes 

 was correct in his assertion, until I met with the specimen, a figure of wliich is here 

 given. Knowiag the interest attached to such a specimen, I sent it to Mr. Blyth for inspec- 

 tion, and that gentleman in his Report of the Asiatic Society's Museum for September 1842, 

 makes the following observations on it. " A particularly interesting specimen, as demon- 

 strating what I have for some time been convinced of from observation of the living birds, 



* Proceedings of Zoological Society for 1832, pnge Si. 

 G 



